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Licences for marriages in southern England
(1632-1714)The province or archbishopric of Canterbury covered all England and Wales except for the northern counties in the four dioceses of the archbishopric of York (York, Durham, Chester and Carlisle). Marriage licences were generally issued by the local dioceses, but above them was the jurisdiction of the archbishop. Where the prospective bride and groom were from different dioceses it would be expected that they obtain a licence from the archbishop; in practice, the archbishop residing at Lambeth, and the actual offices of the province being in London, which was itself split into myriad ecclesiastical jurisdictions, and spilled into adjoining dioceses, this facility was particularly resorted to by couples from London and the home counties, although there are quite a few entries referring to parties from further afield. Three calendars of licences issued by the Faculty Office of the archbishop were edited by George A Cokayne (Clarenceux King of Arms) and Edward Alexander Fry and printed as part of the Index Library by the British Record Society Ltd in 1905. The first calendar is from 14 October 1632 to 31 October 1695 (pp. 1 to 132); the second calendar (awkwardly called Calendar No. 1) runs from November 1695 to December 1706 (132-225); the third (Calendar No. 2) from January 1707 to December 1721, but was transcribed only to the death of queen Anne, 1 August 1714. The calendars give only the dates and the full names of both parties. Where the corresponding marriage allegations had been printed in abstract by colonel Joseph Lemuel Chester in volume xxiv of the Harleian Society (1886), an asterisk is put by the entry in this publication. The licences indicated an intention to marry, but not all licences resulted in a wedding.